


The Mountain

by DaisyNinjaGirl



Series: The Tenner [19]
Category: Himalayan Mountain Climbers RPF, Mountaineering RPF
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-11
Updated: 2020-06-11
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:13:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 650
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24655126
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DaisyNinjaGirl/pseuds/DaisyNinjaGirl
Summary: Day Ten - AriseOn Old Earth, there is a great range of mountains that divides nations, called the Cradle of Snow. Many of the mountains there rise up into the thinnest of airs, brushing at the sky; one is the highest known on Earth. Some who live near it call it the Holy Mother.
Relationships: Ed Hillary & Tenzing Norgay
Series: The Tenner [19]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1680610
Kudos: 2
Collections: The Tenner





	The Mountain

_Edward took off his spectacles and cleaned them carefully._

**The Mountain**

On Old Earth, there is a great range of mountains that divides nations, called the Cradle of Snow. Many of the mountains there rise up into the thinnest of airs, brushing at the sky; one is the highest known on Earth. Some who live near it call it the Holy Mother.

As such things go, men (rarely women) see something high and want to overcome it. They want to dominate it, and put their name on it. Such a one was the man who gave it the name that goes on maps, Everest. Such were the many men from all over the world who sought to climb it. For many years, this was a futile effort - in reputation - and yet every time someone climbed the Holy Mother and returned, more was known. More about the air, more about the ridges and lines and crevasses. With each climb just a few more steps were cut to ease the path of the next journeyer.

One day, a man called Ed and a man called Norgay were hired to try to make the climb. There were many others they travelled with, but after Ed fell down a crevasse to be rescued by Norgay, they were fast friends and always worked together. They come from utterly different worlds. Norgay had grown up in the shadow of the Mountain, and was a Prince of climbers, a Sirdar, who had climbed the lesser slopes of the Holy Mother six times before, who had reached the highest point any man was known to have reached. Ed was a beekeeper from a group of islands far away, a tall boy who had grown up in the sun, rafting on a great river.

The great mass of mountainers, and soldiers, and reporters, and porters climbed in stages. They built camps and ferried food to them. They gave each mountaineer time to grow used to the thin vasty air. When they were ready, the first pair of mountaineers left to attempt the final ascent. Their comrades watched carefully to see black dots crawling their way down, their heads hanging.

Then it was Ed's and Norgay’s turn. They strapped on packs of a little food and great tanks of oxygen. They climbed. Oh, how they climbed, their breath straining, gaining a little sleep in a tent pinned down on the mountainside by oxygen tanks. They made their final climb on a diet of chocolate and hot lemonade. The higher they got, the more the sky became the black colour of outer space. Some call this part of the Holy Mother the “dying zone.” But Ed and Norgay, Norgay and Ed, were the best climbers in the world. Near the top they found a great black escarpment wall, with no cracks or crannies that a cunning climber might jam his fingers into. Ed found an icewall at one end and jammed himself in the narrow gap and pushed himself up with his feet. He sent down a rope to his friend and they kept on climbing together. The rest of it was easy, a gentle stroll but for the thinness of the air, the Mother giving her pilgrims one blessed easy walk to her summit.

They left sweets, a pencil, a gold cross. Ed took a photograph of Norgay, with prayer flags on his axe. And then they walked back down.

When they reached the base camp, they told their friends that they had climbed to the top together, just that, because without each other, and without the others of their expedition, and without the expeditions that had mapped and scaled and loved the Mountain, no one could have reached the top.

And that is my story, of the Mountain that brushes the night black sky of space, and of the first humans to climb it. Just because it is there.


End file.
